Easy Stuffed Peppers Recipe – Vegan and Gluten Free Stuffing

Following up on a previous easy stuffed peppers recipe, today I came up with a new one. The steps to make this dish are easy, ingredients are inexpensive, and preparation time is around 40 minutes.

Having lived in Mexico for so long, I fell in love with stuffed peppers. Although I had eaten them before I moved to Mexico, I had never tried them with spicier peppers. So far I had only tried stuffed Bell Peppers which are nice and sweet. Nonetheless, I never really learned to eat a lot of chili like they do here. I like chili and my favorite ones are Poblano, Piquin, Chipotle, and a little bit of Jalapeño. I draw the line at Habanero, though 😉 that one just burns my mouth 😉

When I cook I sometimes use chilies, but in smaller amounts. Feel free to adapt the level of spicy in this recipe as you wish. We all have different levels of resistance to hot chili peppers. Poblano is pretty mild in general, but if you leave in too many seeds they can be really hot. Yes, the spiciness is in the seeds.

This recipe includes vegan cheese. Not all vegan cheeses are gluten free, but there are plenty that are, so vegan and gluten free is possible and doesn’t limit taste. 🙂

The vegan cheeses in the pictures below are gluten free. Daiya cheese (on the right) is not only gluten free but soy free as well.

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Ingredients (for 2)

• a pinch of Himalayan salt
• 2 cups of water
• 6 Poblano peppers
• 4 Brussels sprouts
• 1 large sweet potato
• 1 carrot
• vegan cheese (Follow Your Heart Mozzarella is gluten free)

Instructions

• Chop potato, carrot, and sprouts in small pieces
• Bring water to a boil and add salt
• Add chopped potato, carrot, and sprouts to water
• Cook until tender
• Remove from heat and drain water
• Pre-heat oven at F 350 degrees
• Remove stems from the Poblano peppers
• Scrape out the seeds. Make sure you scrape out all the seeds or as many as possible. Since the seeds contain the spiciness of the peppers, the less seeds they have the milder they will taste. You can leave a few seeds for a nice kick, but don’t leave in too many.TIP: after removing the seeds, avoid touching the area around your eyes. You’ll thank me later 😉 (it leaves an irritating, burning sensation for a long time. In case you forgot about this advice – believe me, although I know this, I sometimes tend to forget this too – wash your eyes out with cold water)
• Sprinkle some water in a baking dish and lay the peppers in it. Drizzle them with some olive oil. Cover with foil and bake for 15 minutes to soften them.
• Remove tray from oven and stuff peppers with vegetable mix and vegan cheese. You may alternate a few times, cheese, veggies, cheese, veggies.
• Return tray to the oven and bake for another 20 minutes or until cheese is melted.
• OPTIONAL: if you do not have an oven or you prefer not to bake this dish, you can also heat your peppers in a pan (with olive oil is fine), on low to medium heat for 20 minutes, turning them around from time to time. I sometimes sprinkle some water on them during the process.
  • The next step then would be to remove the peppers from the pan, stuff them with the boiled veggies and vegan cheese, and then heat them again in the pan until the cheese has melted.

Final Thoughts

My recipes are based on my personal preferences and taste, but they are also perfect to use as a guide and prepare them al gusto or improvise with them.

You can replace the veggies I used for this stuffing. Sweet potato, however, gives a lovely taste, and mixed with chopped sprouts, carrots, and melted cheese it is a great combination of flavors. Even if you are not a fan of Brussels sprouts, mixed in with the sweetness of the potato and carrot you won’t notice its slightly bitter bite.

This recipe is enough for two people and the peppers can be stored in the refrigerator to be re-heated later. They are also a good boxlunch for work – just heat them in the microwave.

I also think that they can be used as both a side dish or a main meal. If you have any questions or other ideas, please let me know in the comments. I am looking forward to reading them.